Honorary Consul, The: Amazon.co.uk: Graham Greene: Books Honorary Consul, The Customers Who Bought This Item Also Bought Page 1 of 1 Start over Page 1 of 1 This shopping feature will continue to load items. In order to navigate out of this carousel please use your heading shortcut key to navigate to the next or previous heading. Enter your mobile number or email address below and we'll send you a link to download the free Kindle App. Then you can start reading Kindle books on your smartphone, tablet, or computer - no Kindle device required. Apple To get the free app, enter your mobile phone number. or Don't have a Kindle? Get your Kindle here , or download a FREE Kindle Reading App . Product details By James on 22 Dec. 2011 Format: Paperback This book typifies what many people have labelled as `Greeneland': a tragi-comic world (usually more tragic than comic) in which people are confronted by awkward choices which require them to examine or re-examine their values and which often lead them to behave in ways which they would previously have rejected.

The book is set in Argentina, where the British honorary consul, Charles Fortnum, is kidnapped by a group who threaten to kill him unless a group of Paraguayan political prisoners is released. Unfortunately for Fortnum, he is so unimportant that none of Britain, Argentina and Paraguay cares about his fate. His only ally is Eduardo Plarr, a half-British doctor who has been friendly with Fortnum but who has also been having an affair with Fortnum's much younger wife Clara. Clara is pregnant; the baby is Plarr's but Fortnum knows nothing of the affair and so assumes that it is his. Plarr pleads Fortnum's case with the kidnappers, whose leader, Leon Rivas, is a lapsed Catholic priest with whom Plarr used to be friendly. Both Plarr and Rivas find themselves in `Greeneland': Plarr is a cold, unemotional man who is forced to re-evaluate his feelings for both Fortnum and Clara; as for Rivas, the prospect of having to murder Fortnum brings his religious faith increasingly into conflict with his political objectives. Lighter moments are provided by some of the more minor characters, especially Saavedra, a mediocre but self-important Argentinian author.

This is one of my favourite Greene novels. It is a clever mix of an adventure story about a kidnapping that goes wrong, and a literary novel about love, faith and moral values. Read more › The Honorary Consul by Graham Greene | LibraryThing "The God I believe in must be responsible for all the evil as well as for all the saints. He has to be a God made in our image with a night-side as well as a day-side." The Honorary Consul is somewhat heavier fare than Graham Greene's "entertainments". The justification of man's actions based on faith or based on the conflict created by the expectations of religious instruction and the reality of life features heavily in this book. Charlie Fortnum is an elderly, worn out diplomat, a British Honorary Consul based in northern Argentina who has been largely forgotten by the Foreign Office until he becomes inadvertently entangled in a plot to kidnap the American ambassador. Unfortunately for Charlie, the kidnapping goes horribly wrong. Even more unfortunate, the Foreign Office don't like the idea of being reminded about Charlie. The only ones who do care about Charlie are his wife and his doctor - two by-standers.

Except of course, that this is Greene-land where soon enough things turn out different from what they appear. ‘It’s not how I intended things,’ Doctor Plarr repeated. He had no anger left with which to defend himself. ‘Nothing is ever what we intend. They didn’t mean to kidnap you. I didn’t mean to start the child. You would almost think there was a great joker somewhere who likes to give a twist to things. Perhaps the dark side of God has a sense of humour.’ ‘What dark side?’ ‘Some crazy notion of León’s. You should have heard that – not the things you did hear.’ So, what we get in The Honorary Consul, is a tense thriller capturing the moral dilemma created by kidnapping and the desperate attempts of atonement by everyone involved. And all of it in Greene's very dark and ironic style: "Free Will was the excuse for everything. It was God’s alibi." ( ) BrokenTune | Aug 21, 2016 | Greene's characters are always so interesting, and here it's the same in this tale of intrigue and kidnapping in South America.

( ) soylentgreen23 | Jul 3, 2016 | The story is set in an unnamed town (though clearly Corrientes) in northern Argentina, near the border with Paraguay. Eduardo Plarr is a young doctor of English descent. As a boy, he left Paraguay with his mother, escaping to Buenos Aires while his English father remained in Paraguay as a political rebel. They never hear from the father again. When Plarr moves to the quiet, subtropical backwater town, he strikes up acquaintance with the only two English inhabitants, a bitter old English teacher, Humphries, and the Honorary Consul of the title, Charles Fortnum, a divorced, self-pitying alcoholic who misuses his position. Plarr's other main acquaintance is Julio Saavedra, a forgotten but self-important Argentine novel writer full of silent machismo. Visiting the local brothel with Saavedra, Plarr is attracted to a girl, but she is taken by another man. A couple of years later, he is called to treat Fortnum's new wife. Plarr sees that she's the same girl from the brothel, Clara.

Plarr regards himself as a cool, self-controlled Englishman (although he has never been to England), he finds himself becoming obsessed by Clara. He later seduces her by buying her some sunglasses and they begin an affair, although he tries to remain emotionally distant from her. "Caring is the only dangerous thing," Plarr says in the novel. "`Love' was a claim which he wouldn't meet, a responsibility he would refuse to accept, a demand. So many times his mother had used the word when he was a child; it was like the threat of an armed robber. `Put up your hands or else ...' Something was always asked in return: obedience, an apology, a kiss which one had no desire to give." Clara becomes pregnant, and Fortnum believes the child is his and starts drinking less. Then some of Plarr's friends from school turn up at his surgery, one of them is a failed priest named Rivas. They have news of Plarr's father; he is alive in a jail in Paraguay. They have a plot, for which they need a doctor's assistance, to kidnap the US ambassador on his trip to Corrientes.

They will demand the release of political prisoners in Paraguay, including Plarr's father, in return for the ambassador. But the band kidnaps the wrong man; Charley Fortnum, the Honorary Consul, who they take to a squalid hut in a shanty town. The rest of the novel charts Plarr's efforts to get Fortnum released, either as a result of diplomatic action from the UK, whose ambassador in BA is a comedy figure, or as a result of his schoolfriends giving up. But no-one listens to him. Saavedra and Humphries fail to help Plarr in his efforts. The police suspect that Plarr is involved in the kidnapping, as they know about his affair with Clara, and his behaviour has been suspicious. And they tell him his father was shot dead in Paraguay while attempting escape. Plarr goes to the hut, where Fortnum has been shot in the leg while attempting escape. Fortnum spends much of his time as he faces up to his death in sentimentalizing about Clara and in remembering the fearsome figure of his father. Then he discovers that Plarr is having an affair with Clara, and that the child is Plarr's.

Meanwhile, members of the motley band drift away, and the police close in and surround the hut, while the failed priest, Father Rivas, conducts a makeshift mass inside with the rain coming down and police waiting. The police deadline is about to expire. Plarr goes out to talk to the police, but he is killed by the paratroopers, along with the other kidnappers. The authorities blame Plarr's death on the kidnappers. Plarr's mother, once a beauty and now bloated, and some of his previous older mistresses attend his funeral. Saavedra reads a homily. The UK embassy then relieves Fortnum of his consulship. In the last scene, Fortnum and Clara attempt a reconciliation. Fortnum will name the child Eduardo. bostonwendym | Mar 3, 2016 | Typical Greene--those with talents squander them, those without talent muddle through, pseudo-innocents are caught up in crossfire, and a pervasive organized oppression is inescapable. Why do I like them so much? Moments of humanity and inspiration, I suppose.

( ) Auckland Consular Corps Reception | The Governor-General of New Zealand Te Kawana Tianara o Aotearoa The Governor-General of New Zealand Te Kawana Tianara o Aotearoa The official web site of the Governor-General of New Zealand Main menu Home › Auckland Consular Corps Reception Auckland Consular Corps Reception Auckland Consular Corps Reception, Government House Auckland 12 Dec 2008 May I begin by greeting everyone in the languages of the realm of New Zealand , in English, Maori, Cook Island Maori, Niuean, Tokelauan and New Zealand Sign Language. Greetings, Kia Ora, Kia Orana, Fakalofa Lahi Atu, Taloha Ni and as it is the evening (Sign) May I specifically greet you: John Desrocher, Consul General of the United States and Dean of the Auckland Consular Corps; Warren Searell, Chief of Protocol for the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade and your colleagues; Members of the Consular Corps; Distinguished Guests otherwise; ladies and gentlemen. Thank you for accepting the invitation of my wife Susan and I to attend this reception for Auckland 's Consular Corps here at Government House in Auckland this evening.

I would like to speak briefly about the importance of your role. At last count, there are now more than 60 consulates in Auckland , with only a relative few being staffed by what can be called "professional" diplomats. There is a stereotype view of consuls, particularly honorary consuls, of people holding sinecure positions and working the cocktail circuit often wearing the linen suit, the sunglasses, and the sticking plaster square (you will know the sort of thing I mean!) Some say the best fictional representation of this, was the character Charles Fortnum from Graham Greene's 1973 novel, The Honorary Consul. This book which was made into a movie of the same name a decade later featured Michael Caine as Fortnum—a divorced, self-pitying alcoholic who misuses his position as consul—and Richard Gere, who played the man who has an affair with his wife. Well, that was, and is, fiction. But the reality, I know, to be somewhat different.

The hardworking Official Secretary at Government House, Rob Taylor, was until he joined us earlier this year, New Zealand 's Consul General in Los Angeles and has told me enough of the legal, sometimes medico-legal, and always taxing parts of his role whilst there. Secondly, throughout my career, and as one who practised law in Auckland , and who was for several years a Board member of the Asia New Zealand Foundation, I have had ongoing contact with members of the consular corps in this city and I continue to be impressed with the breadth of the service you provide. While naturally much official focus is centred on a country's Embassy or High Commission, the consular corps plays an important part in New Zealand 's international relationships. There is an unusual term in English that I believe captures the role of the consular corps well, particularly for those nations whose Ambassador or High Commissioner is not resident in New Zealand .

That term is "johnny-on-the-spot." Commenting on the appearance of this phrase in the English language, an American newspaper in 1896 described a "johnny-on-the-spot" as a person who "may be relied upon, to be at a certain stated place, when wanted, and on whose assured appearance, confident expectation may be based." The writer added that it was not sufficient for this person to be an alert and trustworthy individual to get the title, adding that such a person "must, in addition, render such service and attend to such business, when there, as the occasion may require, and such a 'Johnny' must be on the spot, not merely to attend to the business of others, but also to look after [their] own." I cannot think of a better phrase to describe both the honorary and professional consuls here today. You naturally have your own matters and business to attend to, but also will have become skilled at readily and willingly stepping in to assist people from the nations you represent.

You are not only the "johnny-on-the-spot" for foreign nationals visiting New Zealand but also for your ambassador or high commissioner who may be based in Wellington largest and most ethnically diverse city, emphasises how much New Zealand and our world is changing. My own profile born in New Zealand, parents born in Fiji and migrated here, grandparents born in India and migrated to Fiji, demonstrates how people are increasingly on the move. I feel certain that the role and significance of the consular corps in Auckland will continue to grow. In conclusion I thank you for your service and welcome you to enjoy our hospitality this evening. And with that, I will close in New Zealand 's first language Maori, by offering everyone greetings and wishing you all good health and fortitude in your endeavours. No reira, tena koutou, tena koutou, kia ora, kia kaha, tena koutou katoa. The Honorary Consul : definition of The Honorary Consul and synonyms of The Honorary Consul (English) The Honorary Consul is a British thriller novel by Graham Greene , published in 1973. It was one of the author's favourite works.

[1] Plot summary The story is set in Corrientes, a city in northern Argentina , near the border with Paraguay which can be assumed from the police cars that reads ¨Policía de Corrientes¨. Eduardo Plarr is a young doctor of English descent. As a boy, he left Paraguay with his mother, escaping to Buenos Aires while his English father remained in Paraguay as a political rebel. Aside from a single hand-delivered letter, they never hear from the father again. When Plarr moves to the quiet, subtropical backwater town, he strikes up acquaintance with the only two English inhabitants, a bitter old English teacher, Humphries, and the Honorary Consul of the title, Charles Fortnum, a divorced, self-pitying alcoholic who misuses his position. Plarr's other main acquaintance is Julio Saavedra, a forgotten but self-important Argentine writer of novels full of silent machismo. Visiting the local brothel with Saavedra, Plarr is attracted to a girl, but she is taken by another man. A couple of years later, he is called to treat Fortnum's new wife. Plarr sees that she's the same girl from the brothel, Clara.

Plarr regards himself as a cool, self-controlled Englishman (although he has never been to England), he finds himself becoming obsessed by Clara. He later seduces her by buying her some sunglasses and they begin an affair, although he tries to remain emotionally distant from her. "Caring is the only dangerous thing," Plarr says in the novel. "`Love' was a claim which he wouldn't meet, a responsibility he would refuse to accept, a demand. So many times his mother had used the word when he was a child; it was like the threat of an armed robber. `Put up your hands or else ...' Something was always asked in return: obedience, an apology, a kiss which one had no desire to give." Clara becomes pregnant, and Fortnum believes the child is his and starts drinking less. Then some of Plarr's friends from school turn up at his surgery, one of them is a failed priest named Rivas. They have news of Plarr's father; he is alive in a jail in Paraguay. They have a plot, for which they need a doctor's assistance, to kidnap the US ambassador on his trip to Corrientes.

They will demand the release of political prisoners in Paraguay, including Plarr's father, in return for the ambassador. But the band kidnaps the wrong man; Charley Fortnum, the Honorary Consul, whom they take to a squalid hut in a shanty town . The rest of the novel charts Plarr's efforts to get Fortnum released, either as a result of diplomatic action from the UK, whose ambassador in BA is a comedy figure, or as a result of his schoolfriends giving up. But no-one listens to him. Saavedra and Humphries fail to help Plarr in his efforts. The police suspect that Plarr is involved in the kidnapping, as they know about his affair with Clara, and his behaviour has been suspicious. And they tell him his father was shot dead in Paraguay while attempting escape. Plarr goes to the hut, where Fortnum has been shot in the leg while attempting escape. Fortnum spends much of his time as he faces up to his death in sentimentalizing about Clara and in remembering the fearsome figure of his father. Then he discovers that Plarr is having an affair with Clara, and that the child is Plarr's.

Meanwhile, members of the motley band drift away, and the police close in and surround the hut, while the failed priest, Father Rivas, conducts a makeshift mass inside with the rain coming down and police waiting. The police deadline is about to expire. Plarr goes out to talk to the police , but he is killed by the paratroopers , along with the other kidnappers. The authorities blame Plarr's death on the kidnappers. Plarr's mother, once a beauty and now bloated, and some of his previous older mistresses attend his funeral. Saavedra reads a homily. The UK embassy then relieves Fortnum of his consulship. In the last scene, Fortnum and Clara attempt a reconciliation. Fortnum will name the child Eduardo. Adaptation The book was made into a film, The Honorary Consul (also released as Beyond the Limit), directed by John Mackenzie in 1983, with Richard Gere as Plarr and Michael Caine as Fortnum. The soundtrack theme was composed by Paul McCartney and performed by John Williams . References ^ Allain, M: "Conversations With Graham Greene", page 136.

Penguin Books, 1991 In Search of a Character: Two African Journals (1961) Plays The Return of A.J. Raffles (1975) The Great Jowett (1981) For Whom the Bell Chimes (1983) Screenplays The Future's in the Air (1937) The New Britain (1940) A Sense of Reality (1963) May We Borrow Your Husband? (1967) The Last Word and Other Stories (1990) Short stories Graham Greene Essay - Greene, Graham (Vol. 125) - eNotes.com Graham Greene Essay - Greene, Graham (Vol. 125) Navigate Study Guiderows Graham Greene 1904–1991 English novelist, short story writer, essayist, dramatist, screenplay writer, travel writer, autobiographer, and critic. The following entry presents an overview of Greene's career through 1994. See also, Graham Greene Criticism and volumes 1, 3, 6, 9, 14 and 18.

A prolific and widely popular literary figure, Graham Greene is recognized as one the finest English novelists of the twentieth century. Best known for his engaging thrillers, distinguished for their masterful plotting, moral complexity, and suspenseful themes of pursuit and detection, Greene attained rare prestige as a critical and commercial success. His literary reputation rests primarily on his "Catholic" novels—Brighton Rock (1938), The Power and the Glory (1940), The Heart of the Matter (1948), and The End of the Affair (1951)—and his Cold War political novels, including The Quiet American (1955), A Burnt-Out Case (1961), The Comedians (1966), and The Honorary Consul (1973). A champion of the underdog, the irreverent, and the aggrieved, Greene portrays the human tendency toward corruption and the possibility of redemption. His preoccupation with religious and political topics, colored by his affinity for Catholicism and communism, is a prominent and controversial feature of his fiction.

A consummate storyteller noted for his realistic style and idiosyncratic ethical perspective, Greene is considered among the most accomplished writers of his generation. Biographical Information Born in Berkhamsted, Hertfordshire, England, Greene was one of six children of Charles Henry Greene, headmaster of Berkhamsted School, and Marion R. Greene, a relative of Robert Louis Stevenson. A precocious introvert and sensitive soul, Greene endured a miserable childhood at the hands of his moralizing father and boarding school brutes. At age sixteen he suffered a nervous breakdown and briefly fled home, leading to a period of psychoanalytic treatment. Greene's unhappy adolescence, punctuated by intense boredom and flirtations with suicide, informed much of his early writing and iconoclastic sentiments. Upon graduating from Berkhamsted School, Greene attended Balliol College, Oxford, where he studied modern history and earned an undergraduate degree in 1925. While at Oxford, Greene briefly joined the Communist Party and met his future wife, Vivien Dayrell Browning, whom he married in 1927. Shortly before their marriage, he converted from Anglicanism to Roman Catholicism.

Greene worked as a sub-editor for the Times of London from 1926 until the publication his first novel, The Man Within (1929), after which he became a full-time writer. Weak sales of his next two novels prompted him to write Stamboul Train (1932), the first of many popular thriller's subtitled "entertainments," including A Gun for Sale (1936), The Confidential Agent (1939), The Ministry of Fear (1943), and The Third Man (1950). His first volume of short stories appeared as The Basement Room and Other Stories (1936). During the 1930s, Greene wrote film criticism for Night and Day and Spectator, collected in The Pleasure-Dome (1972). He also travelled to Liberia and Mexico to gather experiences for his fiction, recorded in the travelogues Journey Without Maps (1936) and The Lawless Roads (1939).

The novels It's a Battlefield (1934) and England Made Me (1935) illustrate his lifelong leftist sympathies, which later were distinguished by notorious associations with Soviet spy Kim Philby, Fidel Castro, and Ho Chi Minh. Greene produced the first of his "Catholic" novels with Brighton Rock (1938), followed by The Power and the Glory (1940), The Heart of the Matter (1948), and The End of the Affair (1951)—among his best-known works. After serving with the British Foreign Office in Sierre Leone during the Second World War, Greene witnessed political upheavals in Indochina, the Belgian Congo, Haiti, and Cuba as an freelance journalist. The post-war novels The Quiet American (1955), Our Man in Havana (1958), A Burnt-Out Case (1961), and The Comedians (1966) reflect his interest in international affairs during the Cold War. Greene adapted many of his novels and "entertainments" into screenplays.

He also published additional volumes of short stories, including Nineteen Stories (1947) and A Sense of Reality (1963). Greene also wrote several plays, notably The Living Room (1953), The Potting Shed (1957), and The Complaisant Lover (1959). His other late novels such as The Honorary Consul (1973), The Human Factor (1978), and The Tenth Man (1985) were well received. Among his many distinctions and honorary degrees, Greene was named Companion of Honour in England (1966), Chevalier of the Legion of Honor in France (1967), Companion of Literature by the Royal Society of Literature (1984), and received the British Order of Merit (1986). Greene died in Vevey, Switzerland, at age eighty-six. His personal experiences are documented in two autobiographies—A Sort of Life (1971) and the sequel Ways of Escape (1980). Major Works Greene's enormous popularity and critical recognition is based largely upon his "Catholic" and political novels.

Though variously classified as "entertainments" and novels proper, each reflects his serious preoccupation with aspects of spiritual edification, moral turpitude, ideological commitment, and the potential for salvation in the modern world. Drawing upon the narrative conventions of crime and spy fiction, Greene's novels often involve exotic international settings and alluring depiction of murder, adultery, political intrigue, suicide, assassination, and pursuit. The protagonists are typically fallen or hapless characters whose moral failings, both innate and socially conditioned, reflect a broad range of corruption and suffering, especially as caused by extremes of disengagement and orthodoxy. Greene's four "Catholic" novels—Brighton Rock, The Power and the Glory, The Heart of the Matter, and The End of the Affair—offer insight into the theological concepts of mortal sin and atonement, drawing attention to the paradoxical virtues of vice itself. Set in the working-class neighborhood of a seaside resort town, Brighton Rock features Pinkie Brown, a teenage thug who exacts vengeance on a newspaperman for betraying his gang. Pinkie marries Rose, a naive waitress, to stonewall testimony against him.

Ida Arnold, a local matron and unlikely investigator, eventually takes up the case and hounds Pinkie to his death. The Catholic theme comes to the forefront when Rose consults a priest about Pinkie's damnation. The Power and the Glory is set in Mexico during anticlerical persecutions of the 1930s. The protagonist is a renegade Catholic priest who continues to carry out his ecclesiastic duties despite official sanctions that have driven away all other priests. An unrepentant though self-loathing sinner—he is an alcoholic and father of an illegitimate child—the "whiskey priest" is tracked by a "mestizo," or half-caste, and eventually captured by the police. His martyrdom is complicated by the contradictory facts of his charity and unsaintly indulgence. The Heart of the Matter, which takes place in Sierra Leone, involves Major Scobie, a Catholic policeman and devout husband whose tragic vice—pity—leads him to betray his wife, religion, and profession in an extramarital affair and diamond smuggling scheme that drives him to suicide.

Among his most overt religious novels, The End of the Affair involves an English woman whose passionate love for God is mistaken for an adulterous affair by her jealous husband and former lover. Greene's political novels—The Quiet American, A Burnt-Out Case, The Comedians, and The Honorary Consul—are set against the backdrop of contemporary Third World trouble spots in Asia, Africa, and Latin America. Though drawing attention to the sociopolitical circumstances of each locale, the religious concerns of earlier novels persist in the overarching theme of moral ambiguity. The Quiet American is set in Vietnam during the turbulent 1950s. Noted for its anti-Americanism, Greene juxtaposes the practical hedonism of Thomas Fowler, a cynical English journalist, with the puritanical innocence of Alden Pyle, an idealistic American whose naive and self-righteous assumptions about Indochinese culture lead to his demise. A Burnt-Out Case involves a leprosarium in the Congo where Querry, a disillusioned doctor, grapples with his lack of compassion for human suffering by engaging in a futile battle with the mutilating disease, drawing parallels between the ravages of leprosy and a life without faith.

The Comedians takes place in Haiti during the dictatorship of Francois Duvalier. The story revolves around the experiences of Brown, a lapsed Catholic and hotel owner engaged in a doomed affair with a diplomat's wife, the Smiths, an American couple committed to vegetarianism, and Jones, a con-man, as they are drawn into revolutionary activities. Brown's view of God as a "practical joker" underscores his indifference and the absurdity of the appalling violence and exploitation under Duvalier. Set in Paraguay, The Honorary Consul centers upon Eduardo Plarr, a doctor of English-Paraguayan descent who aids a Paraguayan guerrilla group. Among the rebels is Rivas, Plarr's former classmate and an ex-priest. Plarr becomes entangled in an ethical dilemma when the guerrillas kidnap an elderly ambassador, Charley Fortnum, whom Plarr is called upon to care for. Fortnum's young wife is also Plarr's mistress, further complicating his moral obligations. The Human Factor involves an international espionage scandal caused by Castle, a minor British intelligence officer who leaks information to the Soviets to aid black South Africans, among whom is his wife.

When the security breach is discovered, another agent is mistakenly murdered before authorities close in on Castle and he flees for Moscow, leaving his wife and child behind. Critical Reception Greene is considered one of the most outstanding British novelists of the century. Widely praised for his superb narrative abilities, vivid cinematic descriptions, and compelling fusion of religious and political themes, he is regarded as a master craftsman and formidable moralist. Though critics discern the literary influence of Henry James and Joseph Conrad in his work, Greene confesses an equal debt to adventure writers such as H. Rider Haggard, John Buchan, and Stanley Weyman. Credited with redefining the modern suspense novel, most critics contend that Greene's melodramatic plots and sensational depiction of violence and sex belie a complex synthesis of theology, world politics, and existential psychology that elevate his popular thrillers to the level of high literature. Critics agree that Greene's "Catholic" and political novels are his masterpieces and constitute the central achievement of his large oeuvre, particularly Brighton Rock, The Power and the Glory, and The End of the Affair.

Critical attention is frequently directed toward Greene's distinct religious perspective, controversial left-wing rhetoric, and recurring themes of pursuit and moral equivocation in his novels. While some of Greene's detractors find fault in his preoccupation with Catholicism, cited as a narrow obsession that confines his novels to sectarian eschatology and Manichean divisions, others assert the universal significance of such themes as they relate to problems of moral obligation and political commitment. As many critics note, Greene's sympathetic sinners, criminals, and double agents symbolize the degradation of the individual and necessity of moral compromise amid the hellish realities of violence, corruption, and poverty in the modern world. An international best-selling author, Greene's fiction is acclaimed for its entertainment value and provocative examination of sin, moral relativism, and problems associated with spiritual faith in the contemporary world. More Content: Greene, Graham (Vol. 125) (hide) Indian industrialists choose to represent diplomatic interests of other countries : Living - India Today 15051997 A + A - Who's that guy?

The Indian-looking gentleman in a car with a flag announcing his arrival, the name of a vaguely familiar country spelt out large on its nameplate and adorned by a fancy heraldic logo bringing up the rear, has long been a mystery. Is he a diplomat of Indian origin? Is he just taking a ride? Is he an Indian? And if so, how can he have all that exotic plumage?Well, he can if he's an honorary consul. In India, honorary consuls have normally been on the fringes of diplomatic circles and the chattering classes. Vivek C. Burman, Nicaragua Managing Director, Dabur India, Delhi "They probably chose me because my image fitted their requirement." Hardly the image of the career diplomat, Vivek Burman, 50-something, belongs to the new genre of honorary consuls who represent the trade and political interests of several countries in India. Burman represents the volatile Latin American country since 1995: Nicaragua closed down its diplomatic mission in 1991 for economic reasons. About his selection as the honorary consul, Burman says: "I met their finance minister and a few top diplomats in New York and I was interviewed by them.

Probably they chose me because my image fitted their requirement." Burman's 115-year-old family company expects a turnover of Rs 700 crore this year. But wealth, he says, was not the sole consideration. "The name of Dabur is a household one in India and members of our family have been educated abroad." He can offer the Government of Nicaragua style. The consulate is situated in one of Delhi's high-premium localities. Though he drives around in a Rolls Royce, "I fly the Nicaraguan flag on my Mercedes," he says. Gradually building up a secretariat for Nicaraguan affairs, Burman will lobby for increased bilateral trade. Trade not politics, he feels, does more to cement ties. Recently, he wrote to Nicaragua about the feasibility of a commercial venture for film shooting. "I have friends in the Indian film industry and they are keen to experiment with exotic locations. Nicaragua is a sure bet." Burman wants to push Indian exports to Nicaragua; he also plans to treat the country as the entry point for the Latin American market for Dabur products.

Occasionally seen and seldom heard, most of them give the odd visa, push a little trade, arrange things for visiting dignitaries for countries too poor, too small, or just indifferent. A clink of crystal in the capital's living rooms, or a chance encounter abroad, a business tryst, and, voila, one more honorary consul appears on the horizon and swells the ranks in Delhi, Mumbai, Chennai or Calcutta. Today there are about 95 honorary consuls in these cities, and the tribe is proliferating: Goa just got its first. The mushrooming took place in the last decade, with the real spurt in the early '90s: Delhi had only seven in 1990, it has 21 today, and several in the pipeline. Mumbai with 29 has the largest number: in 1985 there were only 18. Chennai has 22 and Calcutta 23. Liberalisation opened the floodgates: smaller countries which could not afford missions wanted in on India's opening markets. Even the countries splintering from the former Soviet Union in 1989 drooled over a share of the pie.

Virendra Punj, Ivory Coast Chairman, CT Cotton Yarn, Delhi "Socialising in the name of protocol, or otherwise, helps." Afirm in delhi wants to send its engineers to Ivory Coast for a civil-construction project. The Ministry of External Affairs directs them to an address in Connaught Place. They find the consulate among a maze of company offices. And by evening their visas are ready. For the honorary consul, Virendra Punj, 59, it was just routine. The African country can't afford a mission here and while its mission in Moscow looks after its dealings with India, Punj is authorised to grant visas. His appointment came following a visit to the Ivory Coast as president of the Engineering Export Promotion Council of India. Today Punj celebrates the National Day of Ivory Coast at his sprawling mansion in Lutyens' Delhi. "You are a businessman and such socialising always helps-be it in the name of protocol or be it otherwise,"says Punj. "As a diplomatic mission, the Moscow ambassador looks after the India territory. But with increasing merchandise, the secretariat of the honorary consul in India is becoming busier," he says.

Punj is promoting small manufacturers of light engineering products in Ludhiana and Jalandhar rather than the big guys. Trade with Ivory Coast, he claims, has grown 14 times in the past couple of years. As one writes, the figure could well go up. But it's not the numbers which intrigue; it's why well-heeled industrialists whose annual turnovers would approximate the GNPs of the tiny countries they represent want to be honorary consuls. Among the new recruits are Vivek Burman of the Rs 700 crore Dabur empire, Gautam Kahnna, former president of the Oberoi group of hotels and son-in-law of M.S. Oberoi, Virendra K. Punj of CT Cotton and a host of other companies, L.K. Malhotra who owns Delhi's Surya Hotel, Sudhir Choudhrie of Magnum Trading, franchisees for Adidas products in India, Vipin Khanna of Allied Domecq Breweries who is also into steel, sugar and much else or Pawan Morarka, managing director (MD) of WH Brady and Co. Why do these and, indeed, many of the other debutant honorary consul generals or consuls want the appointments?

Vilas Lokhandwala, Ghana Social Worker, Mumbai "I realised how much I could do to help people." Plump and amiable, vilas lokhandwala looks like the aunty next door and, at 49, is the honorary consul of the Republic of Ghana. She is a widow living in a Gujarati joint family in one of those shabby but prestigious art-deco buildings on Mumbai's Marine Drive. One room in the house is now the consulate-desk, fax, her pictures with Mother Teresa and Rajiv Gandhi, chairs for visitors. The tryst with Ghana began at a dinner party in 1992. The high commissioner of Ghana, Kwabena Baahdudu, had come to Mumbai, and Lokhandwala was called upon to introduce him because of her African connection. Born in Dar-e-Salaam, Tanzania, to a Gujarati trader who emigrated at 14, she had made Mumbai her home-after graduation from Bombay University and marriage in 1973-and began exporting medicines to Africa. She must have impressed him: a year later Baahdudu returned and asked her to find an honorary consul.

Several top business houses trading with Ghana offered their MDs-and were rejected. Baahdudu turned to Lokhandwala. "I realised how much I could do to help people," says Lokhandwala, who holds a doctorate in sociology. Those now getting that help are Ghanaians arrested on drug charges. At present, there are 11 of them at Yeravada; two of them undertrials whose cases haven't come up for 10 years. She pursues the cases, liaises with their lawyers. Other duties include issuing visas, receiving VIPs, and promoting trade between the two countries. Lokhandwala enjoys her work though it hasn't helped her finances-she pays for every fax and phone call, pays her own petrol bills and keeps her own cars. As she says, "It's an expensive appointment.'' Well, they get to have a consular letterhead, fly what looks like a designer flag on their cars, hang it in their homes and host national day parties-for which they get duty-free alcohol and cigarettes-and parachute into that rarefied fraternity, the diplomatic and consular corps, with a chance to rub shoulders with the influential and the glitterati that come together at those national days.

Morarka, who at 41 is probably the youngest honorary consul general-he represents Costa Rica-was thrilled to accompany his country's foreign minister this winter to have tea with the President. But these are just frills. Below that icing of quasi-diplomatic status and trimmings is the real cake: easy access to the corridors of power. They can walk into any ministry. They can walk straight past other businessmen being made to cool their heels by a mere deputy secretary in the visitor-unfriendly receptions of the critical ministries of commerce, industry and finance. The perks of the job include identity cards which not only open difficult bureaucratic doors but are also Open Sesame for the Lok Sabha and the Rajya Sabha. Honorary consuls can sit in the Diplomats' Gallery, glide their way into the forbidden recesses of international airports, even drive their cars up to the aircraft at airports when dignitaries from 'their' country come calling. Anil kadakia, brazil managing director, Ashok organic industries, Mumbai "There's no question of using my post for personal gain." For anil kadakia, the honorary consul of Brazil in Mumbai, business is mixed with, well, honour.

Diplomacy grew out of trading interests for the anaesthesiologist turned businessman after he began importing raw material from Brazil for his chemicals business in 1984. On a trip to Rio soon after, Kadakia "fell in love" with Brazil and, on his return, formed the Indo-Brazilian Society. The high point of his career: getting Brazilian President Fernando Cardoso, then visiting Delhi, to "drop by" in 1996. Anil kadakia, brazil managing director, Ashok organic industries, Mumbai "There's no question of using my post for personal gain." For Anil kadakia, the honorary consul of Brazil in Mumbai, business is mixed with, well, honour. Diplomacy grew out of trading interests for the anaesthesiologist turned businessman after he began importing raw material from Brazil for his chemicals business in 1984. On a trip to Rio soon after, Kadakia "fell in love" with Brazil and, on his return, formed the Indo-Brazilian Society. The high point of his career: getting Brazilian President Fernando Cardoso, then visiting Delhi, to "drop by" in 1996.

Even more important, their official documents can get through the mail without the scrutiny of Big Brother: honorary consuls' mail, explains an official in the Ministry of External Affairs, cannot be checked if it is "official". And more important still, the office of an honorary consul or consul general is inviolate. The police or the Income Tax Department can't just drop by. There's an invisible Lakshman Rekha keeping out the Government of India from areas in which the documents of the country they represent are kept, even if it is a room in their own homes. But God help them if there's nothing official about it, and they have mixed their personal papers or documents or whatever with the 'official archives and correspondence'. There's also been a sea change in the kind of honorary consuls. The old guard had, and continues to have, some old blue-chip families: the Dubashes, Birlas, Chidambarams, Kotharis. But they were more reticent: being an honorary consul was a bit of a hobby, an expression of friendship, an added flourish on a calling card, and friends to look up in quaint little places on the globe. Or even a real job: G.S.

Bhalla, a former Lok Sabha official who is the honorary consul general of the Republic of Nauru, worked on a salary when he joined in 1985. G.S. Bhalla, Nauru ex-Bureaucrat, Delhi "Mine is a whole-time job unlike others." There's a whiff of the earnest government servant about G.S. Bhalla, the honorary consul general of Nauru-a tiny Pacific island-since 1985. A former officer in the Lok Sabha Secretariat and parliamentary adviser to the Nauru government in 1982-85, Bhalla can be described as a working honorary consul. Until two years ago, he was paid a regular salary and worked full time for Nauru. With the Government restructuring in every direction, Bhalla is now paid a fee, and is currently winding up Paradip Phosphates-in which the Government was a partner with 40 per cent equity- and recruiting Indian professionals for Nauru. The emphasis has shifted to industrialists who are willing to dig into their own deep pockets in pursuit of their consular activities-to further their business interests.

Take Vivek Burman, whose Silver Spirit Rolls Royce opens the most difficult doors. The new honorary consul for Nicaragua, however, doesn't fly the flag of the country he represents on this empress of all cars; he saves the colourful Nicaraguan flag for his more modest Mercedes Benz. Shyam Kothari, chairman of the Chennai-based HC Kothari group of companies, spends Rs 3 lakh a year in his avatar as the honorary consul of Austria. The representatives of Grenada, Latvia and the Grand Duchy of Luxembourg-S.K. Kandhari, Sudhir Choudhrie and Vipin Khanna, respectively-also rely on their own resources and staff. The elegant soirees which many of them throw in their opulent homes in upper-crust Lutyens' Delhi or in sprawling farmhouses certainly out-glitter those given by many an ambassador. C.D Gopinath, Norway Chief Executive, International Services, Chennai "I might represent Norway, but I am an Indian first." From shipping business to the post of honorary consul, it's been a smooth transition for 63-year-old C.D. Gopinath, a wellknown consul in Chennai.

But he makes it clear that he didn't go in search of the job. "Those days countries wanted a local representative to help out with the ships that docked in a city. That's how I came to represent Norway. And when they were looking for a full-time consul, I got the first offer." This was in 1971. In later years, Gopinath was knighted by Norway. Living in India, yet committed to another country, where do Gopinath's loyalties lie during a sporting event? "If it's Norway versus another country, I pitch for Norway. But if India is playing, I always root for India. I might represent Norway, but am an Indian first," he says with pride. The same emotion is reflected when Gopinath refuses to pose in front of his car because the consular flag is fixed on it. "That's meant only for official occasions. It can't be misused." Why would these men want to lighten their pockets? For most, it's good business, eventually. "Earlier, countries would come looking for us, now businessmen are going after them," says businessman M.C. Petachi, honorary consul for Finland.

Industrialists like Punj, the honorary consul general of Ivory Coast, or Sunder T. Vachani, who heads the Rs 150 crore Weston, also make no bones about their real interests. Vachani admits he uses this designation to socialise with people who matter. "It also helps me to negotiate business deals for my country,'' he adds. Khanna believes that if a prosperous country like the Grand Duchy of Luxembourg were to establish banks in India it would help them all. The culture of influential businessmen and industrialists donning the mantle of diplomats started in the mid-'80s when the then prime minister, Rajiv Gandhi, encouraged the idea. But it is really coming into its own now. All those breakaway countries from the former Soviet Union- Latvia, Estonia and Kazakhstan - are now prospecting too. As are the small countries in the Caribbean, Latin America or Africa. A.C. Muthiah, Belgium Vice-Chairman and President, SPIC, Chennai "A successful businessman is also a good diplomat." It's all in the family. Four members of the M.A. Chidambaram clan, promoters of the SPIC Group, are consuls.

First, patriarch Chidambaram was appointed honorary consul of the Philippines in 1968. In 1993, grandson Ashwin Muthiah (at left) took over. The patriarch's son, A.C. Muthiah (at right), was appointed consul for Belgium in 1988. Sons-in-law R. Muthu and C.T. Chidambaram represent Switzerland and Holland, respectively. "You need to be a good diplomat to be a successful businessman," says A.C. Muthiah. "My brief is to encourage trade between India and Costa Rica," says Morarka, who wants to use Costa Rica as a distribution point to central America. He even wants to piggyback on it to gain access to NAFTA (the North American Free Trade Agreement) which includes the USA, Mexico and Canada. These countries, a cynical honorary consul says, are not interested in CTBT or the finer points of diplomacy, but business. The reason they are veering towards the more market-savvy, affluent Indians to represent them-people willing to spend their own money to maintain their status, who can deal with bottlenecks in Customs or problems caused by junior government officials. P.K.

Bonerjee, Burkina Faso and Liberia Property Baron, Calcutta "The man in power is one Watson. I've never seen him." If anyone approximates Graham Greene's eponymous Honorary Consul, it is Pronit Kumar Bonerjee, who represents both Liberia and Burkina Faso in Calcutta. Both countries, however, seem to have forgotten about their representative. The last time the Liberian government got in touch with Bonerjee, whose father was their previous consul, was years ago-when they sent him some official stationery. Bonerjee isn't even sure who rules strife-torn Liberia today. "If I am correct, the man in power is one Captain Watson. I've never seen him, or even his pictures." Nor can he call them: "The telephones don't work, and most numbers have changed. I am totally at sea." It's much the same with Burkina Faso, which he's been representing since the '60s. Bonerjee does not even know its current national day. But there was a brief burst of activity in 1995, when P.V. Narasimha Rao, then prime minister, visited the country.

Bonerjee arranged the visas for his entourage. This much has been enough to keep him going. But honorary consuls are only embryonic diplomats: they do not have diplomatic immunity and are not exempt from the laws of the land according to the 1963 Vienna Convention on Consular Relations. Honorary consuls don't even have the right to put CDs or CCs on their cars. Nor the names of their countries, though some of them bend that rule. Traditionally, honorary consuls have been on the fringes of the diplomatic circles in India, usually well below the salt, their names on the bottom end of guest lists and whose parties the snooty nabobs of South Block seldom attend. Even diplomats usually turn down their noses and the invitations for their national days. But all this is changing. As is the image, indelibly inked in the mind, of Graham Greene's marvellous caricature of the figure in his novel The Honorary Consul. There was an outpost, frayed-end-of-empire feel about the Charlie Fortnum character in a nameless place in Latin America in the novel. S.K.

Kandhari, grenada Director, Taj Group, Delhi "It feels good to talk to the prime minister of Grenada." He's a chartered accountant who handles the affairs of the Nizam of Hyderabad and Maharani Gayatri Devi of Jaipur among others. It was in London in 1994 that S.K. Kandhari, 61, met the then prime minister of Grenada, Nicholas Braithwaite. What he likes about his consular avatar is the chance to meet the more intellectual politicians of this tiny Caribbean country and that "Braithwaite appointed me and he was appointed by the Queen". The free booze, the high which came from hoisting the flag from his modest rooms, the chance to sup with the American ambassador when he came to the forgotten bit of the country across the river from Paraguay, the odd favour occasionally rendered were the highlights for the British expat. In India, it seems the empire is striking back, and with the family. The titles may be hereditary, as in the case of Rajashree Birla who became the honorary consul of the Philippines in Mumbai when her husband, Aditya Birla, died two years ago.

Or passed from father to son, as with Shyam Kothari. Or it's all in the family, like the M.A. Chidambaram family in Chennai, which represents three countries. Or consider this: Bhai Mohan Singh of Ranbaxy is the honorary consul general for San Marino and his son, Bhai Manjit Singh, is the honorary consul; industrialist Kasturi Lal Vig is the honorary consul general for Estonia, his son, Anil, is the honorary consul. And everything's official about it. -with Arun Varma, G.C. Shekhar, Farah Baria and Ruben Banerjee For more news from India Today, follow us on Twitter @indiatoday and on Facebook at facebook.com/IndiaToday For news and videos in Hindi, go to AajTak.in . ताज़ातरीन ख़बरों और वीडियो के लिए आजतक.इन पर आएं.

Question: Charles Fortnum is the eponymous character in whose 1973 novel The Honorary Consul?
Answer: Graham Greene